The Minister for State for Petroleum, Ibe Kachikwu has said that the challenge for oil companies have changed as “they now have got to provide the resources to power this country; jobs for our people; and the operational environment that is transparent enough for others to take Nigeria serious.”
Speaking at the Inaugural Nigerian Institute Petroleum Summit, NIPS, in Abuja, the state minister said: “If you cannot produce cheap cost oil, if you cannot diversify the processing of your oil; if you cannot look to internalising and externalising investment in the sector; if you cannot capture the requisite technological skills that are essential to help you operate efficiently, you are lost before you start.
“Oil has got to provide the technical and advanced skills sets that are essential for us to export people out in to other African countries, and to become investors in other African countries. Something the banking sector has tried to do successfuly over the last six to seven years,” he said.
“I ask everybody to look at the challenges that we face. Africa is probably the continent with the least supply of power. And until power is available, this country, this continent cannot move. Nigeria, obviously, with its 180 million people and growing at a very rapid rate, is critically in need of power. That power won’t come unless gas projects are incentivised and happen, and happen rapidly.
“What is stopping us from that? Africa is the only continent that we still imports most of our petroleum products from abroad. Whereas we have refineries, we have the crude oil.
“Africa is still the only continent where there are question marks in terms of whatever activities in the oil sector, whether we are doing the very best that we can. What is stopping us from improving.
According to him, “Africa is the still the only area with vast amount of resources, where the owners of these resources, all over the nation and all over African countries, continue to cry for neglect and abandonment.
“There are so many challenges, and sometimes you ask yourself, what is holding Africa back? What is it about Africa that prevents it from taking the bold step that is essential for it to move and actually win the liberation that is essential to make it a continent of envy.
He said, “Let me give you the silver lining, which is that most developed countries have reached the peak of their development.
“Africa today, with its bushes and wild-lives and resources, remains the continent yet untapped, abundant potentials, potential possibilities unlimited. If we do the right things at the right time, with the right energy, with the right opportunities, African would begin to move.”
